Take a Breath
by PvtBrook
Summary: "Has she always been this... driven?" A small chuckle escaped the taller girl. "Kind of, just in a different way. She used to be a lot more annoying and, well for the lack of a better phrase, a bitch." [Canon Divergence after Volume 5 Chapter 12]


**I started this before Chapter 12 was released. I didn't want to edit either of the Weiss/Ilia stories I had half-written so I ignored that and went off my own idea of what was going to happen, so for those interested here is a very brief summary of that:**

 **After Weiss was impaled she and Ruby (who remained unconscious) were taken out of the battle and were taken care of. There were actually more then 8 people from the White Fang there to destroy Haven so there was a battle that lasted a while but eventually the protagonist's won and the White Fang fled. Now Weiss is unconscious in the apartment they're living in healing.**

 **Without further adieu, enjoy the story!**

* * *

It has been three days since she was injured and one since they drove the White Fang away from Haven, but not once has Weiss stirred. Blake said it was because her aura was already so depleted at the time she was hurt so it was working overtime and draining her energy. After the battle at Haven everyone was so worn out, and adding each of them taking turns watching over Weiss they were just exhausted.

And that's how Ilia volunteered to watch over the bedridden girl.

Ilia was the only one who was rested enough to keep her eyes on the girl. She didn't just volunteer to watch the Schnee, she insisted. Blake was cautious at first – rightfully so – but the faunus didn't have anything malicious planned. She was genuinely curious about the heiress.

And that's how she was in her current position in a chair beside the bed that Weiss was occupying. During the battle she didn't see much of her; she didn't see her at all actually. She remembered her when reading the news on the SDC when she was in the White Fang, but according to Blake she was a completely different person outside of the media. Ilia wanted to believe it, but she was skeptical.

The faunus was in the bedroom for a boring two hours when the heiress began to stir.

Ilia didn't notice at first being preoccupied with her scroll, but the heiress' breathing quickly started picking up and became heavier. Ilia's head shot upwards when the Schnee started to panic; her eyes wide and her arms grabbing at her wound. Ilia quickly grabbed her arms and kept them pinned to her sides but this only caused Weiss to panic more.

"Weiss, calm down! You're fine; you're in the apartment!"

"Get— Get off!" Weiss thrashed. "Let me go!"

 _"Blake!"_ Ilia shouted at the door. She faced the panicked girl and tried to reassure her but comfort has never been her strong point. "Weiss, you need to calm down! You'll tear your stitches!"

With Weiss still struggling and pulling her arms it was insanely hard to keep her down. Eventually the Schnee landed her knee to the faunus' shoulder. Ilia was knocked back; she couldn't regain her footing as she stumbled back and she landed on her ass.

The door was thrown open with Blake and Yang running in. The two quickly scrambled to the heiress' side to hold her down but it was like Weiss couldn't see them; she kept thrashing and Ilia swore she saw a dark stain on the front of her shirt.

"Weiss, please!" Blake pleaded. "You're safe! You're safe; no one's attacking you!"

Her teammate's voice must have calmed her down because Weiss slowly started to relax. She stopped kicking but she was still nervously trembling. Her eyes finally found focus and set on her teammates.

Yang and Blake let go of her arms and both exhaled with relief. The blonde immediately sat down on the side of the bed and tried to catch Weiss' gaze again but the Schnee had already brought her attention back to her injury. With shaky hands she tried to lift the bottom of the t-shirt Ruby had lent her but Blake held her hand back.

"Let's lay you back down first," the faunus suggested. "Then we can look at the bandages, okay?"

Ilia finally she stood back up and shifted slightly closer to the bed to check on what was happening. She saw Blake and Yang help the wounded girl lie back down before the faunus folded back the hem of the t-shirt. She carefully removed the dirty bandages from around the girl's waist.

The injury was... not pretty. There was dark red and purple bruising around the wound almost looking black. A few of the stitches keeping the gash together had popped and ripped out causing more blood to start to ooze out.

Blake cursed. "Yang, get more bandages for me."

The blonde quickly hurried to the cabinet and pulled out the bandages and tossed them to her. Blake caught them and glanced up at Ilia.

"I'll need your help."

"Um, what?" She asked dumbly.

"I need to clean it and re-bandage it and I would prefer her not to squirm around."

Ilia blinked. "Shouldn't we close the wound first?"

Blake just sighed. "I guarantee she won't stay still for that. Right, Weiss?" She aimed the last part towards her teammate.

The girl just glared, earning a small smile from the faunus. Blake turned her head back a fraction. "Yang, go check on Ruby. We have this."

The brawler shuffled and crossed her arms. "Are you sure? I can stay."

Weiss finally spoke up. "Just go look after Ruby already," she demanded; her voice still raspy.

Yang rolled her eyes and left. Blake let out a sigh as she started dabbing the cotton pad in some of the alcohol, her ears twitched a fraction. The black haired girl glanced up at Ilia and motioned down at Weiss. "Any time now."

Ilia finally moved from the place she's been standing in for the past few minutes to stand beside the bed. "Uh, where...?

Blake rolled her eyes. "Just hold her shoulder and her hip. And please try to keep her from moving."

"I'd appreciate it if you didn't speak like I was unconscious," the heiress groaned.

"Oh okay," Blake said sarcastically. "Ilia is going to put a hand on your shoulder and a hand on your hip to keep you from spasming."

"Haha," she rolled her eyes. "You're acting more and more like Yang every day."

Ilia smiled at the interaction before nervously holding the areas she was instructed to. The two faunus took deep breaths before Blake finally started to clean the wound. To say it sounded like it hurt would be an understatement. Ilia had to hold Weiss down with all her strength to prevent her from shooting up. Not once did she yell, but her face was scrunched up in pain and she could tell she had trouble her arms from grabbing at the wound. It was twenty long seconds before Blake tossed the gotten pad on the tray beside her. With Ilia's help the two sat Weiss up to wrap the new bandages around her waist.

"Well," Blake huffed. "That went better than I thought it would."

Weiss just glared tiredly at her.

Blake chuckled. "Should we leave you alone?"

Ilia noticed her eyes were already sliding shut. "I want to know where you've been..."

"I can tell you tomorrow."

"Then I'll be walking by tomorrow."

Blake blinked. "Weiss, no—"

"I _said_ I'll be up by tomorrow," she lied back down with a huff, only slightly wincing this time. "So I'll do it."

"You're impossible."

"Hmm." And she slept.

* * *

"Has she always been like this?"

Blake shut the door behind her carrying a tray with the medical supplies in one arm. She peaked at Ilia from the corner of her eye. "What do you mean?'"

"Weiss," Ilia explained. "Has she always been this... driven?"

A small chuckle escaped the taller girl. "Kind of, just in a different way. She used to be a lot more annoying and, well for the lack of a better phrase, a bitch."

Ilia raised an eyebrow at her friend as she made haste to continue. "She isn't anymore; when we started at Beacon she acted like an entitled brat. After a while-after I revealed I was a faunus-she started to change. She actually bothered to take the faunus point of view into consideration and realized not _all_ faunus are the White Fang."

They arrived to the kitchen and she set the tray on the counter. She tossed the bandages and cotton pad into the garbage and started to wash down the tray in the sink. The chameleon faunus hopped up to sit on the counter beside her. "That's it? She just learnt you were a faunus and her entire perspective was changed at the drop of a hat?"

She laughed at that. "Oh, no, of course not. I ran off and she, Yang, and Ruby spent the better part of the day looking for me. By the time they found me she reached her decision." She put the tray in the drain tray to dry and wiped her hands on the towel as she turned to face her friend. "We also had to help her sometimes; it's hard to forget things you've been taught since a young age; she's always had to keep up that 'Schnee' look. You can relate to that."

She was right, Blake usually was. As a child when she was enrolled in Atlas Prep her mother implored her to act as if she were human. She could go to other girl's houses but she couldn't return the gesture, she couldn't talk about her family when the other girls' spoke so highly if theirs, she couldn't change colours when every other girl was free to show their own. She had to pretend to be a high-class Atlas girl with wealthy parents.

Yeah, she could relate in a way.

"But I don't get it," Ilia mumbled. She pulled her knee up to rest her arms on. "She had _everything_ in Atlas. Even as a kid you hear people talking about _Weiss Schnee_. She's rich, she gets anything she wants."

"That couldn't be further from the truth."

The two faunus turned their heads to the hallway to see Yang strutting down the hallway. Blake's ears perked up much to Ilia's amusement

"Yang, how are you feeling? How's Ruby?"

Yang waved her off. "I'm fine and so is Ruby. She's still sleeping though, she was waiting for Weiss to wake up for a while and she was already dead tired." She hopped on the counter by Ilia with a grin. "So, Weiss?"

"O-oh! Uh..." Ilia stuttered. "It's just..."

Yang pat her shoulder. "When she isn't kind of loopy from just waking up from a mini coma, she can be quite prickly; don't let that stop ya from trying to talk to her. She isn't good at social interactions that aren't with stuck up rich people. And her family life?" She shrugged. "Not my story to tell. Maybe she'll tell you in time."

Yang offered her a smile that she had to return.

"I want to get to know her," Ilia decided. "Not as a Schnee, but as Weiss. I don't know why," she looked at her hands.

Blake just smirked at her. "You want to get to know Weiss, huh?"  
Ilia's spots flushed a pale pink. "S-shut up, not like that!"

The two team members laughed and again, Ilia couldn't help but join in. After the last few days everyone needed a laugh. Finally Ilia stretched and yawned.

"I think I'm gonna go try and sleep. You two have fun," she grinned at them and sent a look at Blake as she slid down from the counter. She went to the room she was sharing with Sun; by the time she got there the guy was already asleep snoring away. The girl flopped down on her bed with her arms behind her head.

She could talk to Weiss tomorrow.

* * *

 **Hope you all enjoyed! As I said I've been working on this on and off for ages and I finally finished so that makes me really happy. Also since I left it on a cliffhanger I decided to edit the other Weiss/Ilia story I have half-done and add it to this.**

 **This is going to be a SERIES, _not_ a multichapter fic. I'm planning to finish Part 2 soon, then I have an idea for Part 3 already. I don't know if I'll finish after Part 3 or not, it depends on the feedback and what angst I can pull from these two. (Since this is on FF I can't label this into its own series so rip)**

 **Thank you all again :D**


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